This week was the launch of the annual Child Health Week, a campaign that provides healthcare for children whose mothers find it difficult to regualrly visit a clinic.
This week was the launch of the annual Child Health Week, a campaign that provides healthcare for children whose mothers find it difficult to regualrly visit a clinic.
The campaign will provide children under the age of five years with Vitamin A, de-worming and immunisations as well as growth monitoring and will continue until 20 September.
On Tuesday, 8 September the campaign was stationed at Raglan Road Clinic where nurses in bright orange uniforms were attending to a large crowd of mothers and their children. Originally there would be two separate campaigns; one for Vitamin A and de-worming while the other was for immunisation. But this year both campaigns have been combined into one large helath drive.
Clinics are often full and so it would require the mothers to take a full day off from work to attend to this vitally important task. Now mothers can either take the day off to go to the clinic or they can go over the weekend. For mothers who find both of these options difficult, the campaign is visiting schools and crèches throughout Grahamstown free of charge. All the children need to bring is a signed consent form from their parents.
While at the Raglan Road Clinic on Tuesday, Nosimiselo Nombombo, who is one of the mothers, told Grocott’s Mail that she had brought her two-year-old son for a Vitamin A shot and de-worming. "I brought my 5-year-old child to this immunizing campaign last year together with my (then) one-year-old son", she said.
She also said that she had brought her first born child, who is now 13 years old, as it is still an effective and greatly needed campaign that is showing no signs of stopping. In fact it is stronger now than it has been in previous years. Phumeza Ngumbela, a community worker who has been working for the campaign for the past two years, says that ”city clinics run a similar campaign”. The difference is that city clinics do not venture out to immunise children.
